


Before Sunset

by NadoHunter



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: 1980s, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - 1980s, Alternate Universe - Domestic, Alternate Universe - High School, Be still my heart!, But the story won't center around it, But there's gonna be a lot of domestic fluff too, Creepy, I'm not going to go into that stuff too much, M/M, My first attempt at creepy/horror stuff lol, Slight Mentions of Prejudice in Later Chapters I am thinking, Will and Seb meeting when their 14-year-old dorks, it just sort of comes with setting this story in the 80s
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-11-14 03:51:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11199888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NadoHunter/pseuds/NadoHunter
Summary: For all intents and purposes, the town is your average boring suburban living space. Yet, as 14-year-old William finds out as he moves in, something about the town isn't quite right. High school is a mess in more ways than one, and he finds himself making friends with a boy named Sebastian Michaelis who lives in a strange house across the street that is just as out of place as Sebastian himself. What secrets does this town keep buried? And is it really worth uncovering those mysteries if your life is on the line?





	1. Morning on a Hot Day

**Author's Note:**

> I'm writing this to take a step back from my Fantasy!AU mainly, since I'm running into a road block with it, but I also wanted to practice some creepy writing as I've been reading a lot of Steven King again recently. So yeah, this is going to be some creepy stuff (hopefully) along with some SebxWill domestic fluff. Enjoy!

The door to the large moving truck slammed, the sound reverberating off the metal walls of the behemoth vehicle. William T. Spears, a scrawny young teenager who had had his fair share of being screamed at by the gym teacher sat with his thin arms wrapped around his rather awkward long legs. He supposed he didn’t have many friends to leave behind, but the act of moving and starting high school in a world completely alien from his hometown still left an uncomfortable pit in his stomach and something leeching off his heart, making it feel heavy and tight. At least back home he knew all the backstreets to run from those he’d rather not catch him, all the secret shortcuts he could cut across if someone decided they really wanted to pick on him that day, the ways to avoid the neighbor with the angry, snarling, drooling dog that had wanted to take a bite out of William from the day he first rode by on his tricycle. Here it was all different.

For one it was _hot_ , he hated the way his shirt stuck to his skin due to the little beads of sweat that seemed to always be present. He didn’t like always having to chug water either for fear of shriveling away like a bit of shredded cheese in a pan. Another thing was it was a smaller town then where he came from. The people here looked sour, like they were always sucking on lemons or having a railroad spike rammed up their ass.

But mom and dad had work here, so that’s where they went. When the moving truck drove away, he walked inside the house, sighing at the slightly cool air inside. He went into the cramped little room where his bed had been awkwardly placed and shuffled around to look busy so his mom wouldn’t get the idea to have him do heavy lifting for the sake of “building mussels” or “getting good exercise”. He just hoped and prayed she wouldn’t give him a lecture on “needing more sunlight” because he was “Paler than his white bedsheets”.

The first night in the new house, he could barely sleep. School the next day was going to be like marching single file into the pits of hell. This was _high_ school, not middle school anymore. He thought in horror that the older kids were going to be even bigger, even more bitter, even scarier. The chances that he would humiliate himself on the first day he calculated were astronomical! He tossed and turned. He thought about faking illness… until he remembered his mother was a doctor, so fat chance of convincing her he was sick and not just paralyzed with fear.

Breakfast was a blur, the gluten-free ultra-healthy cereal was slowly turning into an even more disgusting mush in the funny tasting almond milk. His mom told his dad to go on a diet, so the rest of them were sentenced to bland, tasteless food until mom was “happy”. His dad had tried to sneak him and William some goldfish on the road and they were still getting lectures about it. He wound up “accidently” knocking it onto the floor and getting away with taking an energy bar to walk to school. Even the dog wouldn’t touch the cereal-mush on the floor.

When William got to school, his legs starting to ache a little bit from the walk, he looked around at all the people, tall and small that were walking into the oddly old building. William noted that a few bricks seemed to have fallen out of the wall and what looked like ancient soot and vines coated the rest of the building. He furrowed his brows worriedly. He hoped there wasn’t still lead in the pipes or asbestos in the walls.

He took a deep breath. “ _Just act casual_ ” he told himself and walked towards the door, suddenly feeling as if he had a million eyes staring at him. His gaze darted around wildly and he adjusted his sizable glasses nervously. Suddenly feeling every pore, every stray hair in his body as if he was some sort of disgusting stick figure. No one even noticed him. At least not until, in his daze he walked straight into another boy and a spur of panic he backed up and squinted his eyes shut, bowing his head in shame.

“S-Sorry!” He blurted out hurriedly.

“Uh, hey it’s okay, I wasn’t looking where I was going either.” A small voice with a British accent much like his own echoed through his ears. Despite being somewhat high pitched, the voice was smooth and soft.

He looked up slowly. The other boy was only a little taller than him, a bit less lanky, but still sort of thin and small in stature, he couldn’t have been any older than William, all the boys seemed to shoot up between 14 and 15. William blinked a couple times, holding his books a little tighter as he took the boy in. His eyes, he thought they were brown at first, but no, they were almost a striking deep maroon in color. Like the maroon of the rust on his bike but… nicer than that. His black hair stood up in odd places, the cut slightly messy and uneven. A funny feeling pooled in William’s stomach that was entirely new to him. He opened his mouth awkwardly.

“I, um, sorry…” He said again stupidly.

The other boy shuffled awkwardly. “Um, hey did you move in yesterday?”

William nodded. “Yes, er… from Maine.”

“Oh, cool, I live across the street. I saw you sitting outside yesterday.”

“Oh” was all he could muster in response.

“So um… what’s your name?” The boy pushed.

William nearly jumped out of his skin, when was the last time someone had wanted to know his name?

“Oh! William, It’s William. What about you?” He asked shyly, shoulders raising as if he was trying to fold into himself.

“Sebastian! So William, um… do you know where classroom 104 is?” He asked hopefully, looking a bit lost.

“Oh, that’s where I’m supposed to go!” He said, almost excitedly before his shoulders slowly fell. “But I don’t really know where to go either.”

“Damn… well… if you want we could try and find it together…” Sebastian suggested, folding hands behind his back.

“Okay…” William responded, looking nervously at a rather tall boy that nudged past him in the hall.

They walked together down the hall. The lockers lining the hall were coated with scrapes and rust. William turned his gaze to the ceiling. The florescent lights were dim, giving the hallway a sort of sickly dark feeling despite it being early morning. Small bugs and grime littered the inside of the florescent casing, having accumulated for god knows how long.

“My dad went to this high school too.” Sebastian said suddenly, breaking William’s focus on the ceiling.

“Really? So has your family lived in this town a really long time?” William asked, calmly pushing his large square glasses up his nose.

“Yeah. The way this place looks my great-great grandfather probably went here too.” The red-eyed boy wrinkled his nose as if he had just seen a vulture picking apart a rather large slug. “It kind of sucks though. There’s never anything to do in the summer or the weekends.”

“Don’t you…. Have any friends to pla… hang with?” William had nearly said “play”, yet knowing he had entered high school he was sure saying “play” would sound incredibly childish and perhaps turn away the first person his age he had met.

“Well, not really. Some of the other people my age think I’m weird because of where my family lives. I kinda don’t blame them…” Sebastian buried his hands in his pockets pulling his shoulders in closer to his head.

“You’re the house across from me, right?” William blurted out thoughtfully. He had noticed the house across the street. His mom remarked in amazement that it was an old Victorian-style house, to which his dad huffed that it looked more like a falling-apart mansion that you’d ‘have to be insane to live in’. William could have sworn the stone steps had cracked gargoyles guarding the door. There was no other house like it in the suburban neighborhood. William bit his lip, he wanted to be nice and say it wasn’t weird, but he knew it was a lie. “Well… I don’t think any less of you because you live there.”

Sebastian raised his eyebrows “Really?”

“Yeah well… I mean it’s not your fault your parents live there.”

Sebastian grinned widely at William. It seemed as if he hadn’t had many others want to hang around him when they realized he came from “the creepy-weird house”. William noticed the boy had rather sharp looking canines that made him look somewhat playful. William surprised himself in thinking about how much he liked the other boy’s smile.

They stopped when they realized the hallway turned sharply to the right and ended in a dead end, except for a thin staircase, which upon closer inspection, simply lead to an indent in the wall and then to…. Nowhere.

“Why would you build a staircase in a high school only for it to go nowhere?” William asked tilting his head to the side.

Sebastian lightly kicked the ground with the bottom of his shoe. “It’s _just_ like my house! There are random rooms, and hallways and stairs that go nowhere! My parents still find rooms they didn’t know about, and they grew up there!”

Perhaps the school was just as old as Sebastian’s house, it seemed just as out of place, and yet for whatever reason the other students didn’t seem to mind or pay the odd staircase any second thought.

“Ah! There’s 104!” Sebastian remarked. Their classroom, instead of being entered through a wide door like every other classroom, this door was tall and thin, and was nearly shoved in a corner. Sebastian slowly turned the nob and peeked in, inside were 10 desks. But they weren’t uniform like most of the classrooms in the building. Instead, each desk was slightly different from the other, similar in build and yet seemingly all by different companies and from all different time periods. There was a green, dusty, scratched old chalkboard of all things that wrapped almost around the whole room except for a small gap on the left wall. William would rather listen to nails scratching against the chalkboard then sit in a room with that one… odd… random gap. There was also an old podium and desk for the teacher who had yet to arrive. William and Sebastian shared a look. Despite Sebastian living in an odd house himself, it was obvious he didn’t expect anything like this. And yet… this _was_ room 104, and there were 3 other freshmen students sitting quietly at their desks.

William decided to follow Sebastian as they entered, feeling like he’d rather have a friendly face nearby, even if that ‘friendly face’ was a face he had only _just_ met. William usually liked to sit in the back of the class so he wouldn’t be noticed and out of spit-ball range, yet for this time he made an exception to sit next to Sebastian who decided on the second row from the front.

“This is an awfully small classroom.” William remarked quietly.

“Yeah, all the other ones were bigger. Maybe they had too many students and needed to shove an extra room in really quickly.” Sebastian suggested.

“Or maybe they had a really bad architect?” William offered cheerfully.

“Yeah, probably. Maybe he drank on the job.” Sebastian joked.

William found him smiling and giggling at Sebastian’s remark. He couldn’t remember the last time he had laughed with another person. Sebastian smiled back with that same sharp-toothed playful grin.

 

* * *

 

The first class was led by a very old lady who was so frail William and Sebastian both passed notes joking about how they thought she might be blown over by the air conditioning. She seemed sweet enough, yet she seemed to be hard of both seeing and hearing. Sebastian looked a bit worried at seeing her pale face very tiredly tell them about how the year with her was going to go. When she left the room, Sebastian leaned over to William and whispered “She looks like a ghost, I hope she’s okay…” and William nodded in agreement.

The next teacher before lunch was a very round, hulking, strong man who seemed like a typical 60’s car salesman with a mustered colored suit and tie and a handlebar mustache. He bellowed everything out as if he were the human embodiment of a trombone. He would tell horrible jokes and bark with laughter as if to make up for the horrified silence of the rest of the class.

At the break for lunch William rolled his shoulders back to relax as Sebastian stared forward with wide eyes.

“Who **_are_** these people?!” Sebastian uttered in shock.

“ _Tell_ me about it!” Came another voice. A girl with her long red hair tied up with a long red ribbon walked over to the two boys and sat up on a desk in front of them. She grinned at Sebastian and batted her eyelashes. “Hiiiiii Bassy….”

Sebastian visibly cringed and inadvertently scooted his chair closer to William who had shrunken down out of shyness.

“Er… Hi Grell. Have you met William? He um, moved in across the street from me.”

William nodded politely only to be startled with the girl laying eyes on him and suddenly letting out a gasp as a wide grin spread across her face. She looked him up and down through her cat-eye red glasses causing William to shift uncomfortably in his seat. She hoped off the desk and placed her hands on his desk, leaning uncomfortably close to him. “Hi _Will_.” She grinned widely at him.

“H….Hi…” William uttered nervously.

“Oh he is _cute_!” Grell announced and turned back to Sebastian. “Oh but not as cute as _you_ Bassy, so you don’t need be jelous!”

Sebastian groaned and rolled his eyes.

“Act hard to get all you want but I _know_ we’re meant to be!” She turned back towards William and winked before walking out the door to get to the lunch hall.

William stood up with Sebastian and asked “Er, have you known her for a while?”

Sebastian grimaced. “Yeah, too long. She was the only other kid to hang around me and well… I couldn’t get rid of her.” They walked side by side together to get lunch. Despite being as old as the rest of the building, the large room was more normal with your standard disgusting food that one might think would get up and walk off the plate if you watched it long enough. William and Sebastian both seemed to have known better and brought their own lunch.

“What do you have?” Sebastian asked William curiously.

William pushed his glasses up his nose and peered into the brown paper bag. “Uh… Tuna sandwich, pretzels and….” He smiled “my dad snuck me a cookie.”

Sebastian nodded, very impressed. “Does your mom not let you have sweets?”

“Well… kinda. She thinks I shouldn’t have sugar in the middle of the day when I’m active. And I guess she’s a doctor but….”

Sebastian huffed and grabbed his own sandwich. “Well… even if your mom is _technically_ right. Sugar is fun, and you only live so long so… why not enjoy yourself?” He grinned as he pulled a full cupcake out of his bag. The icing had gotten a bit messy and squished, but that didn’t stop the messy-haired boy from licking the icing off the plastic wrap. If you’re the type of person to enjoy icing, you just can’t let that stuff go to waste.

William smiled back. “Yeah… your right! I like that!” He nodded happily.

It was so nice sitting with someone at lunch, someone who wanted to hear what you had to say even if it was something as mundane as “I like tuna sandwiches but not egg salad”. William thought Sebastian didn’t seem exactly unpopular as he often found himself. Yet he hadn’t made any moves to join any of the other tables when they were sitting, and instead took William to one of the few empty ones. However, William thought that even if Sebastian did have other friends, he wouldn’t mind trying to get along with them just for the sake of being around the other boy and getting to know him.

William told him about the town he had come from. It had been near the sea. Not near a beach exactly, it was a town that sat high above the sea on a cliff. There was a park and a lighthouse, but it was affordable and his mom would commute everyday into the bigger city to go to work. This town was similar in that his mom would commute out of the small town to go to work in the bigger hospital, but it was slightly closer to her workplace which had been the major reason for moving in the first place.

“That sounds really nice though… but I guess living here for my whole life makes me really want to see other places.” Sebastian mused.

“Yeah, when we were moving we got to see a whole lot of interesting sites. I wish we could have stopped and explored more…” William hummed, finishing off the rather large cookie his farther had left him.

“Yeah… that sounds nice.” Sebastian leaned forward on his hands, thinking deeply, probably imagining what the rest of the world could possibly look like. William thought about what it might be like to travel all over the world with someone just as excited as you to see the new sights and explore the nooks and crannies of the earth.

They were both snapped out of their innocent trance and musings on seeing the world when a large number of bangs and screams from the other students erupted through the air. Sebastian and William both leapt up, eyes darting around for the source of the sound.

A large chunk of the ceiling, completely out of nowhere had crumbled and collapsed, dropping concrete and what seemed to be old furniture onto the lunchroom floor. A frantic girl’s voice yelled “John! Oh GOD John is under there!”

That was when the younger students were ushered out of the room and were gathered outside. Presumably their parents had been called. William and Sebastian unconsiously leaned close to each other. It was so startling they simply gravitated to the kind person they knew the closest. Neither of them minded either when Grell came to hang around them too.

“What was _that_?” She asked.

“The ceiling just gave away.” Sebastian whispered.

“But it’s made of concrete, it’s an old building but it shouldn’t give away like _that_.” He thought out loud.

They heard several sirens scream into the parking lot. That’s when they were all lead to the other side of the building. Yet, just as they were turning the corner Sebastian grabbed William’s arm out of shock. When William stared to look where Sebastian had frozen, petrified. He saw all the bodies, mangled and _bloody_ with bone sticking out in places that made his muscles ache and his skin crawl. They were being hurried out one by one on stretchers. A dark thought hit him that his mother might be so busy she wouldn’t be coming home that night, and thought that he should call her to tell her he was okay, if she didn’t call first.

He pulled Sebastian away, holding his hand. Yet as they stood together on the other side of the building, they knew they had seen something that would stick out like the old-school building in the domestic suburban town.


	2. Sleepover on A Hot Eve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, the most comforting thing in facing fear and ambiguity is to have someone beside you to hold your hand and ground you in safety.

 School was cancelled for the next few days, and William’s parents had already begun to argue on whether their move was a good idea or not.

“The kids… they were… if you had seen them! It was horrible! That could have been our boy!”

“You think I’m not scared for him either? But we’ve already moved _1,000_ miles away for _your_ job. It’s not my fault you didn’t look up more about the town before trying to uproot us!”

“Do you even realize how busy I am? I don’t have time! You should have done the research if you were so worried about it!”

“Well _excuse_ me Ava for not being able to read your mind and _trusting your judgement_.”

“Thomas Spears! How _dare_ you!!!”

William in the meantime stayed in his room with the lights off, curled up in his blankets, hearing their shouting through the walls. He could have told them both this was all a bad idea if they had asked him. He only nice thing he had come across so far was… Sebastian.

If nothing at all, he hoped that he would at least not lose a chance to make a new friend.

The next morning, he was puttering around his room, putting away his books and trying to figure out a good place to sit with his laptop before giving up and settling on laying on his bed. He jumped when there was a knock on the door and his dad marched to open it, taking big hulking strides as always. William thought nothing more of it until his dad came quickly to William’s door, almost as if he was running and knocked on his son’s door. William scrambled off his bed and opened the door plain white door. His dad was beaming at him. “There’s another boy here to see you!”

William’s face must have lit up because his dad seemed to be oozing a proud aura. How long had it been since he had been greeted by a friend of William’s wanting to hang out? Neither of them remembered, at least right then.

William peered around his dad, and saw Sebastian looking around curiously in the front hall. He jogged over cheerily and Sebastian beamed at him in return.

“Hi!” William said excitedly.

“Hey!” Sebastian responded.

“I’ll be in my office if you two need me.” William’s dad chirped. One might have thought if he grinned any wider his smile would pop right off his face. William wasn’t sure if he had ever seen his dad so shamelessly excited.

“Thank you Mr. Spears.”

“Thanks dad.”

William then led Sebastian to his room and moved his books so they could sit on his bed. “Sorry it’s kinda small and I didn’t put all my stuff away yet.”

Sebastian sat on the bed next to William, curiously picking one of the many books sprawled about up to look at it. “That’s alright.”

After smiling in amusement at the book, which he realized was a middle school year book he ran his eyes around the room. “I like it! I have two bedrooms.”

William blinked a couple times in amazement. “Two?”

“Yeah, my old man says I can have a third one if I get an A in math this year.”

“Woah, what do you even keep in all those rooms?” William asked scooting closer to Sebastian and looking over his shoulder at his own year book that was decidedly free of any signatures excepting a sympathy signature from his English teacher.

Sebastian shrugged. “I dunno. Stuff I guess. Mom and Dad give me a lot of things I don’t use all the time. So, I have the first room for sleeping and doing stuff, and another one for doing other stuff…. Oh sometimes I eat dinner and lunch in room number 2 instead of downstairs.”

“Are you like… really rich?”

Sebastian looked up and bit his lip. “I hadn’t really thought about it. I guess most kids don’t have two rooms, huh?”

William shook his head. “Not that I know of. But I don’t know too many people.” He admitted.

Sebastian shrugged. “Well if you wanna come over tomorrow, you can. We don’t have school for the rest of the week.”

William nodded excitedly. “Okay!” He paused and cleared his throat. “Er… sounds… good.” He corrected, making his tone a little calmer this time, he didn’t want this boy to think he wasn’t cool or something.

Sebastian laughed and nudged William. “You’re funny.” He continued flipping through the year book and mindlessly asked “So where are you in here?”

“Oh, page 21.”

Sebastian flipped to the page where William, two years younger looked incredibly petrified to be have his picture taken. Sebastian giggled and pointed to the picture. “I relate so hard.”

William nodded and smiled. “Yeah, I had just got braces that day, so yeah, I’m trying really hard to keep my mouth closed. I refused to smile.”

“I don’t blame you, regular braces look scary. My teeth have always been pretty straight.”

“Oh.” William mused. “Lucky.”

“What was it like having metal in your teeth?” Sebastian asked, closing the book and unconsciously ran his tongue along the front of his teeth.

“Well, weird at first, and sometimes it hurts a lot after they tightened them, but I kinda got used to them after a while.” William inadvertently mirrored Sebastian and ran his tongue along his teeth as well, feeling the perfectly straight row of smooth teeth.

“That’s killer...” Sebastian muttered. His eyes shifted around the room, taking in little details, before seeming to notice something, he stood up and picked up a singular trophy on William’s shelf, reading the inscription on the front.

William went a bit red in the face. If he had known Sebastian was coming over he probably would have hid it.

“You won a short story contest?” Sebastian grinned over his shoulder, running his fingers along the golden surface.

William looked down bashfully, crossing his legs. “It’s kind of silly, isn’t it?”

“Not at all!” Sebastian fell back onto the bed, making William bounce lightly in the air. He leaned over to him turning the trophy in his hand. “I think it’s cool. I can’t really write at all.”

A light smile crossed William’s face, heart fluttering a bit. He remembered how fast he had grabbed the award and run off stage. He had only submitted his short story after his English teacher pleaded with him to do so, he never thought he would _win_. He had run with it all the way home, and hid it under his bed. That was until his dad was cleaning and found it. His Dad was so proud to have a “little gifted novelist in the house”, mom just thought it was cute.

“Can I read the story you wrote some time? Er, if you still have it and it’s okay.” He asked shyly.

“Y-yeah, Yeah sure!” William got up and shuffled through an unpacked box until he found the little story he had written, leafing through it breifly before handing it to Sebastian. He had never willingly handed that story to anyone. He had even thought about ripping it up and taking a failed grade for not turning in his homework.

Sebastian laid down lazily on the bed and began to read. William lightly lay down next to him not knowing really what else to do, and watched his face shift with different emotions as he read. The boy’s face was incredibly expressive; Will was a bit amazed at how easily many thoughts could be recognized going across his features. He found himself a bit drawn in by the faces he made.

Sebastian sat up, having finished the short story. “It’s stellar! Like… oh my god!” He proclaimed. “It’s not silly at all, I can see why you won.”

William turned a bit red once again, his brows furrowing and his eyes darting away as he grabbed his own arm and squeezed it. “R-really?”

“Yeah, it was kind of sad though.” Sebastian thought out loud.

William suddenly turned to Sebastian, confused. “Why? It was written to be a cheery story with a happy ending.”

Sebastian shrugged. “Well… I guess, the main character sacrificed so much and was so strong and yet,” he paused, analyzing William’s features “No one ever gave him any credit or praised him… he was just… alone.”

William tilted his head to the side. “Is it really that sad to be a silent hero?”

“Well, I don’t know. When I do something good, I guess I want to have someone to share the moment with or get excited with me.” He lightly played with the edge of the old papers that had been quickly stabled together and crumpled many times.

William shrugged. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. It is kind of sad, but I you’re the first to notice.”

After that, the two spent the next while talking about random things, their interests, thoughts, lives and family. When William’s mom came home, his dad leapt to the door like a large ballerina and grabbed her to prevent her from disturbing them. Yet, their surprise and excitement became obvious when Ava and Thomas Spears tore apart the kitchen making cookies completely out of their usual habits completely forgetting their previous arguments. Ava didn’t even question when Thomas had cheerfully revealed quite a bit of cookie dough from his hidden stash.

William and Sebastian thoroughly enjoyed their cookie snacks, sprawled out on the floor, having spent time looking through the boxes and surrounded by random figures and books William typically kept in his room. When suddenly, when the air had become quiet and stagnant… the two of them exchanged glances, they knew then what they both wanted to talk about.

“So, the ceiling…” William started.

“Yeah, that was like… freaky. Wicked creepy.” Sebastian nodded, playing with his finger tips.

“It shouldn’t fall like that unless something crazy heavy was suddenly on it.” William hit hand with his fist for emphasis.

Sebastian eyed William’s hands, thinking. “Or hit it hard, like with a hammer or something. ‘Cause it had to go through the floor above and all the stuff in between there and the ceiling… and what was all that furniture doing up there anyway?” Sebastian sat up and turned towards William, who in turn mirrored his movement.

“Maybe there was water damage?” William suggested.

“I don’t think so… I don’t think it would have fallen like that if it was because of weather over time…. “ Sebastian grumbled.

“Yeah, none of it makes sense…”

“It’s nuts!”

They both sat in silence for a moment.

“You think the people under the..?” Sebastian started asking, furrowing his brows.

William bit his lip. “I don’t wanna say it but… my mom’s a doctor, she saw some of the cases. She wouldn’t tell me much but she said ‘It wasn’t good’ So.. someone probably is…” William couldn’t bring himself to say the word, the word they were both dreading. The word that encompassed the very thing that all of us eventually fear to be.

“Dead.” Sebastian finished with barely a whisper.

They stared at each other, a heavy feeling hung in the air. The two of them didn’t know whether to hug and comfort each other, or pretend like nothing happened. A lot of things can go wrong on the first day of school, for someone to die on the first day was on a whole other ‘level’ of ‘wrong. The rest of their lives at that school would be forever tainted by that knowledge.

They both nearly jumped out of their skin when there was a knock at the door and William’s mom poked her head in. “Sebastian, I don’t want to keep you from your parents if you need to be back by a certain time, but would you like to join us for dinner?” She asked sweetly. She had a long thin face and rather big thick glasses like William. Her smile was kind despite holding eyes that had obviously seen wretched things and simply learned to live with them.

Sebastian perked up. “Yeah sure! My parents are actually out of town, so the only person who is home is the butler and the other housekeeping people, and they know where I am.” He then stopped and turned to William. “Er, that is if you don’t mind Will… you might be kind of tired of me by now.”

“No! No not at all.” He chirped excitedly.

The dinner eventually evolved into William shyly asking Sebastian to stay overnight, it had been so long, and he was so excited to entertain. Sebastian, despite being friendly, himself, excepted as well.

“I hate being alone in that place anyway, and my parents are always busy.”

“Well, you can come over an-y-time. We’d be happy to have ya!” Thomas proclaimed excitedly.

William grinned at Sebastian. His parents were up through the atmosphere and halfway to Neptune with joy. Ever since their son had started elementary school, they had watched the beaming, sweet smiles he usually gave slip away from his face as the everyday grind of school and negative social interactions began to grate away at his child-like optimism and sweetness. It was horrible for a parent to watch, and not know what to do. For in some ways, many adults weren’t even quite sure how they made it to adulthood and each new generation brought new horrors to a high school kid.

By the time they had eaten, and it was actually time for bed, the two boys lay, lights out but eyes wide open, continuing to chat late into the night.

“I’m glad I could stay over with you Will, I _really_ don’t like being in my house when my parents are gone.” Sebastian whispered, turning over on the spare mattress William’s parents had for the guestroom. “I haven’t gone over to a friend’s house in… forever…”

William’s heart fluttered at being called a ‘friend’, he tilted his head curiously at the ceiling. “Your house does look a little scary from the outside at least.”

“It’s even scarier inside… and well, I don’t know, since it’s old, at night I always hear weird sounds. Then I get scared and start seeing things in the shadows…” He admitted, fiddling with the corner of his blanket. “Silly, isn’t it?”

“Not at all, sometimes I get scared of shadows in my room too. Especially when I’m feeling alone or something.”

Sebastian smiled. “I’m glad you get it William, my parents think I’m being immature and stupid.”

“I don’t think it’s immature. I bet they get scared by shadows sometimes too but are too stubborn to admit it. But, hey if you ever get scared, maybe you can come over here. I wouldn’t mind.” William suggested, letting his hand drop over the side of his bed and hang down.

“Really? I’d like that… if it’s okay…”

With William in the room with him, somehow the pictures of frightening creatures his mind made out of the shadows… seemed like just shadows, like they couldn’t hurt him. William himself was under the opinion, if there is anything potentially dangerous, it’s best to face it with someone by your side rather than alone. He never got why groups of friends always seemed to split up in movies, he always knew… if he had a good friend he’d never leave his side if something terrible or scary was happening, both for himself and the friend.

“Anytime Sebastian. I promise. I’ll be there.”


	3. Addams Family Rip Off

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> William explores the somewhat devoid-of-fun town, and finally gets to see inside the Michaelis family home, and take a step in making a deeper connection with someone for the first time in a long while.

The next morning came all too soon for the boys. They put their pillows over their eyes trying to pretend the sun wasn’t streaming through the curtains like an uptight business man on a strict schedule determined to have them awake by a certain time. They eventually had breakfast, talking to each other sleepily, keeping their late stay up a secret, but of course William’s parents knew, parents always knew if you had stayed up to the early hours of the morning.

That was when Sebastian decided he should finally return home, but he was so excited to have made a new friend that he didn’t want to go at all, but William waved as his new friend walked across the street to the decaying mansion of a house, pulled a key out from under the doormat and unlocked the front door. He smiled and waved one more time to William before disappearing all together.

The next day, William pulled his bike out from the garage, deciding to take a ride around the neighborhood and town to see if there was anything interesting to do. He smiled as he rode through a few leaf piles, enjoying the crunch that the multi-colored leaves made underneath him and the cool wind that whipped through his hair and caressed his face.

He decided after a few hours that the traits of the season were the most interesting thing about the town. He shelled over $0.40 for a chocolate bar at the local store, which was well stocked with treats and snacks for the local kids and teens, but other than that... well, William wasn’t sure how anyone killed time here at all. There did seem to be an arcade machine in the corner, it had seen better days. He heard the low beeps and playful jingle of pac man playing, hoping to entice any youngsters to either put in coins themselves, or beg their parents for a few cents. William considered giving it a go, just to do something… yet he noticed some older teens collecting a rather large amount of snacks. He wondered how they thought they were going to eat of that… but he supposed they must be really hungry… but just because they were there he decided to leave Pac Man to the experts and not risk getting cornered.

He figured, that people either stayed home and hopped there was something good on television or went outside if they were feeling particularly ambitious. He had passed a few houses where some kids were playing with balls and riding around on their bikes, but there was certainly no place to go. It seemed the town’s main attraction was an odd number of antique stores most likely there for eccentric collectors or elderly people to snoop around in when passing through town.

There was a neighborhood pool, but of course it had already been drained for the season, so it sat empty, dirty, and collecting leaves. There was a park for young children, but William knew he was too old for such a thing. He didn’t linger around the park long, he hadn’t had the imagination to entertain himself outside for what seemed like a long time.

So with that he rode home and sat on his front porch eating his candy bar as he tapped his foot looking at Sebastian’s house. He was staring at it for a while before he saw a curtain covering a window on the top floor move to the side. Sebastian peaked out of it and spotted William quickly. He grinned and waved excitedly, William waved back with a smile on his face. Sebastian disappeared from the window, and not long after came out the front door and ran over.

“Hi Will!” He greeted happily.

“Hello Sebastian.” William stood up, throwing his candy wrapper to the side.

“Did you go into town today?” Sebastian asked, eyeing the bike that had been propped up against a large oak in the yard.

“Yeah, there’s not much to do, I don’t know how you stood it if you grew up here.”

“Ohhhh yeah, I know!” He groaned and rolled his eyes for emphasis. “I don’t know how I survive. TV or books I guess. I hear older kids drive out to the city sometimes, or they drive way out and camp out on their own.”

William sighed “That sounds fun.”

Sebastian kicked the grass below his feet and gave William a bright grin. “Well, maybe we can go do that someday.”

They stood outside and chatted, Sebastian pointing out a few more oddities about the town. For one, there was a road leading out of town that was cracked and filled with potholes that apparently hadn’t been fixed in over 50 years. One of the only hang outs aside from the corner store was the abandoned train tracks that had rusted over for… god knows how long. Small parts of the town were ancient, but the suburbs were put in recently. 1979 specifically as Sebastian said, he remembered the non-stop construction that nearly made him want to put his head through a wall only three years ago.

After a while, Sebastian finally asked if William would like to come over to his house, he did, and with a brief shout to his parents to let them know where he was, he was right by Sebastian’s side, walking up the rickety steps into the old house.

Inside was a lot cleaner than the outside. William looked around in amazement. If he didn’t know any better, Sebastian was a descendant of a member of _The Addams Family_ , he almost expected a disembodied hand to pop up any moment. There was a obvious goth theme in the décor, and was beginning to wonder if they got all their stuff from the antique stores, or the stores got all their stuff from this family. William noted there were a large number of mirrors in the front room. Sebastian grinned at William.

“It is kind of weird, isn’t it?”

“It’s just different… it doesn’t mean it’s bad.” He mused.

He absentmindedly stared into one of the mirrors, catching Sebastian staring at William’s reflection. He nudged William playfully after having been caught staring.

“Well now I know you’re not a vampire, right?”

What an odd thing to say, but William laughed anyway. “No, not the last time I checked, if I was, I wouldn’t have been outside though, right?”

Sebastian shrugged. “Dad says there’s types of vampires that can… er…” he stopped “Well, uh, before you get freaked out, my dad just really likes myths and stuff.”

William nodded in understanding “It’s okay, I think all parents have something their obsessed with, my dad is obsessed with _Knight Rider_.”

Sebastian nodded slowly “That’s the show with the talking car right?”

“Yep.” William confirmed “It’s all he ever talks about sometimes, drives mom nuts.”

Sebastian took William through the kitchen, which William noticed was ridiculously modern compared to everything else.

“This is my favorite room…. Doesn’t smell weird.” Sebastian grumbled.

Now that Sebastian mentioned it, there was an underlying smell in the rest of the house, not of dust, but garlic? And something else, it wasn’t anything he knew, not mold… he couldn’t identify it.

Sebastian continued walking pointing down one corridor “That hallway doesn’t go anywhere.” He opened a door on one side of the hall facing the kitchen and living room. Behind it, was another door! William blinked, Sebastian held up one finger telling him to wait. The second door didn’t have a handle, but Sebastian took a screwdriver, and stuck it in the hole where it should go. “When we finally got this open for the first time…”

He opened it, only for them to be faced by a brick wall that seemed to have been put up hastily.

“What…” William muttered in confusion.

“I know.” Sebastian said rolling his eyes. “I think I’d give anything to live in a house like yours… you know… normal.”

William turned, spotting a lovely stained glass door that lead out to the backyard. He spotted what seemed like a large green house.

“Oh!” Sebastian ran over and opened the door. “My mom is a botanist.”

William whistled in amazement. “Wow… your mom and my mom should talk… she gets a lot of people assuming she’s a nurse… not a doctor.”

Sebastian nodded “Yeah, my mom said she’s got people who talk down to her all the time, like she’s a kid ‘interested’ in science. They should totally hang out, I think your right, they’d like each other.”

They walked out to the greenhouse, inside were some plants William recognized, but others that almost looked alien to him. He spotted, sitting on a table some sort of odd stalk with freakish green bulbs.

“What’s that? It looks like it was grown in outer space!”

Sebastian held back a chuckle “Brussel sprouts.”

William went a bit pink, he didn’t know Brussel sprouts grew on such weird stalks. He suddenly liked them even less than before… he didn’t even know that was possible.

“Oh.”

Sebastian finally laughed “No, no they do kind of look weird.”

After a while, they finally made their way up a long spiral staircase, Sebastian pointed out odd things along the way. For example, most of their activities were done on the third floor, since the only way to get to the second floor was by a stairway in the basement, and apparently, Sebastian wasn’t allowed to go down there.

When they got to Sebastian’s room, William nearly had a heart attack, it was so… nice. He felt ashamed of his tiny little room compared to this. There was an obvious number of toys and games Sebastian hadn’t touched in ages.

Sebastian blushed and turned away from William “I… um… have some board games I haven’t been able to play, because no one comes over…Do, do you want to?”

William’s face lit up “Sure!”

It was a case of two lonely young boys finally being able to have someone to play with for the first time.

They played battle ship, which William won pretty quickly, chess which ended in a stalemate, monopoly…. Where William ended up bankrupt and frustrated… but it was all in good fun. It was then William spotted a particular board game.

“Sebastian… is that..?” His heart lit up, he didn’t peg Sebastian as the type… he seemed to cool, but perhaps?

Sebastian looked at what William was pointing out, going bright red and stuttering “What! Yes, No! Wait…. I …. Er… Do… do you like it.”

“Do I like it? Of course, I do, I grew up on Star Trek… I just… didn’t think you’d like it.”

“No, I do…” Sebastian said sheepishly. “I used to watch it with my dad.”

“I watched it with my dad too. We have it all on tape.”

“Er… so… you want to play?”

“Yeah! I didn’t even know there was a Star Trek game…” William said kneeling forward excitedly. It felt like another step towards feeling like he could be himself.

“I never got to play it, even if I did talk to someone else… I knew they’d think I was, well, a dork.”

William sat next to him, a bit closer than he meant to. “I get it, I sort of gave up on not being called a dork or a nerd a while ago.”

Sebastian laughed. “I’ve avoided the ‘dork’ title… but I still get called a freak.”

“Well I don’t think you’re a freak.” William said honestly. In all fairness, he thought Sebastian looked nice enough to be one of the popular kids.

“Well I don’t think you’re a dork.” Sebastian commented, beaming at his new friend. “And anyway, us odd balls got to stick together right?”

“Yeah, yeah they do.” William replied, a calm smile forming on his face, and a funny… yet pleasant feeling forming in his chest as his heart began to beat just a little faster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yes! If it wasn't already obvious, this story takes place in the 80s!  
> I've been doing a lot of research for it lately, so hopefully I can do it justice!


End file.
